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Resource Sustain Taliyah

Elite4Runner··2 votes·1,137 views

I have a habit of trying to look at abilities in ways that people undervalue, and Taliyah's Q has an interesting mechanic that I think people are overlooking.

So her Q has two forms of cast, on worked ground and off. Everyone is focusing on using her Q on non-worked ground because it deals more damage, so of course it is naturally more appealing. When I see something like this, I tend to think, why did Riot decide to incorporate this mechanic? She passively gains movement speed, but not an overwhelming amount, so I don't think this was the big trade off. Instead of firing five rocks, she fires only one, and it deals the same amount of damage as one of the rocks she throws on non-worked ground. So she potentially deals about a fifth of the damage. It HAS to be the refunded mana. She really does have mana problems without using this mechanic. Without mana items, she only has around 1000 mana at max level. Q is her cheapest ability, at max rank costing 80 mana. Even this is nearly one tenth of her maximum mana. That's a problem!

So my theory here is Riot designed her Q to provide a way to be able to farm/poke with sustained mana until she is able to engage with her Q with greater damage and full combo to secure the kill.

Now, I have an idea for how to build her to support this. It may be a bit more than needed in order to accomplish a sustainable kit, but I think it would work very well.

item 3070 Rushing Tear will help you start stacking mana and make the cost of all of her abilities better by refunding 15% of the mana cost on cast. This especially works well with Q cast on worked ground as it should refund the amount of mana cost before the ability refund. So it should refund 0.15 x 60 = 9 mana before refunding an additional 30 mana. On top of that, it adds 4 mana to your maximum mana pool, resulting in a net cost of -17 mana at first rank.

item 3027 After stacking Tear, this should be enough to resolve her mana problems. However, I think rushing for Rod of Ages after will help her survivability, it has good synergy with Tear items because of the mana it offers, and the new passive will help to restore HP every time mana is spent. If I am correct about the way these items and abilities are worded, this passive should be very efficient because the HP restored should still be based on the total mana cost before all refunds. So even with Q at max rank, you will restore 20 HP, 27.5 HP for E & W.

item 3003 Upgrading Tear to Archangle's Staff will increase the amount of mana refunded from 15% to 25% and grant +8 mana per stack. While stacking, each Q on worked ground will cost 80 at max ranks, refunded half (40), refunded 25% (20), granted +8 max mana. -80 + 40 + 20 + 8 = -12 mana

So with what we have now, each cast of Q on worked ground costs you a net of 12 mana and you will gain 20 HP. That's pretty efficient.

item 3040 By the time you have completed this item, you will probably have at least a third item and mana will no longer be an issue. Using Q on non-worked ground will probably be something you had transitioned to easily already, and your AP should have stacked up enough to keep you relevant.

Other items Consider, some more mana items, some defense stats, some CDR, and of course more AP

I like the sound of item 3025 for a defensive build and some item 3009 to go with them for movement speed utility.

If you want a more offensive build item 3100 will offer the AP needed, a bit of CDR and the movement speed item 3020 would be good boots for the m-pen.

Anyways that's my idea. Let me know what you think, and if anyone has access to PBE, please try this out and let me know what you think.

17 Comments

ModWulf Helhammer2 votes

Found this build to be pretty fun: Rylai's, Morrello's, Liandry's, Abyssal, Zhonya's, Sorc boots. Kiting queen

Elite4Runner1 votes

{quoted}

Found this build to be pretty fun: Rylai's, Morrello's, Liandry's, Abyssal, Zhonya's, Sorc boots. Kiting queen

Sorry, replied to the wrong comment. I see everyone using Rylies lately. I like the item but I'm kinda getting tired of seeing it tbh. That's not to say that it's bad in general, or bad on her, because it's clearly not.

Also your build seems more geared toward damage, not sustain. Of course you'll be able to dish out the damage, but in an extended fight you'll find yourself running out of mana. My build gets rid of that issue and creates a cost effective heal on every ability cast.

Do you have access to the PBE? Would you mind trying this out for me?

ModWulf Helhammer2 votes

Her mana costs aren't that high (highest is 110 at max rank), and Morellos has the old Athenes passive (mana restore on champion kill and assist).

I'll try out the build though, just to see how it feels

Elite4Runner1 votes

{quoted}

Her mana costs aren't that high (highest is 110 at max rank), and Morellos has the old Athenes passive (mana restore on champion kill and assist).

I'll try out the build though, just to see how it feels

I must have missed the Morellos when I read it. That makes some more sense.

And thank you for trying it out.

Nekusen2 votes

They still intend non-worked casting to be the best thing as Worked-Ground duration lowers with CD, so they would be promoting people to not build CDR if they make worked-casting better.

Elite4Runner1 votes

{quoted}

They still intend non-worked casting to be the best thing as Worked-Ground duration lowers with CD, so they would be promoting people to not build CDR if they make worked-casting better.

Unless it's simply not started on the league wiki page for her, which is possible as I know her kit isn't final, worked ground doesn't lower CDR

ModWulf Helhammer3 votes

He means CDR lowers the duration of worked ground

Elite4Runner1 votes

{quoted}

He means CDR lowers the duration of worked ground

Ah, I see. I wasn't aware of that. Thank you.

Nekusen1 votes

{quoted}

Ah, I see. I wasn't aware of that. Thank you.

 60/65/70/75/80 Mana 

10/8.5/7/5.5/4 sec Cooldown 

Hurls 5 rocks in a direction, dealing 60/80/100/120/140 (+.4 AP) magic damage in a small area around the first enemy hit. Subsequent hits on the same unit deal 50% reduced damage. Creates Worked Ground for 180 **(scales down with cdr)** seconds. 

Taliyah gains [10-20%, half of passive] movement speed on Worked Ground. Casting Threaded Volley on Worked Ground only hurls 1 rock but refunds half it's mana cost.

       ** Worked Ground Cooldown with 40% CDR = 108 seconds**

source: http://www.surrenderat20.net/2016/05/53-pbe-update-taliyah.html

MrBuffington2 votes

I've been playing her a bit on PBE, only customs though. I give my thoughts in more detail here and here, in case you feel like reading.

I haven't tried a tear build on her, but personally I don't think it's necessary, since she has pretty medium cooldowns (early; her Q cooldown is low in the mid-game) and can't really spam her spells to stack tear. This is especially true because if you're spamming your spells, you're probably getting the mana refund on Q a lot because you run out of space to get a full Q if you're spamming it. RoA's also changed so it actually doesn't give a ton of mana, although it does have the passive. Still, I feel like RoA is now better suited to more battle mages, who get up closer and trade mana for health and vice-versa.

Her recommended items for some reason don't include a mana item; they have Rylai's and Liandry's listed as her core items, so either they've been able to get by without as much mana during internal testing, or her recommended items are just busted. It's also possible, because she returns to lane faster than most champions because of her passive (and ult), that it's easier to go with less mana, because backing doesn't hurt you as much.

I've been going Morellonomicon first and haven't been having any issues with mana; granted I've been playing vs. bots so I probably get a lot more mana back from the passive than a regular game. Still, RedMercy did a gameplay where he didn't get a mana item until the game was pretty much over (he was sustaining off double dorans and blue buff), and he only really struggled in prolonged fights/sieges where he didn't have blue. I think Morellos will give her enough mana. Blue buff is also stronger now, and there's a chance for water dragon, so having a huge mana pool isn't as important on her as say, Cassiopeia.

I don't think IBG is good on her; it's a tank item, doesn't give AP anymore. She's not stacking armor, so the slow zone isn't great, plus she already has a good amount of utility and control. If you really need the slow, Rylai's is the better option.

The only way you really get into mana trouble is if you're spamming your EW to waveclear and don't buy a mana item. It's difficult to really spam your Q because you'll just work all the earth around you, and won't have the space to cast your full Q. You can absolutely do your build, I just don't think Tear is necessary.

Elite4Runner1 votes

I do like and agree with your theory on her playstyle. It definitely does benefit her from a damage aspect to venture to new ground. My theory actually utilizes the same theory but from a different perspective. By limiting the amount of ground you claim you deal less damage but over a longer period of time due to her mana refund. You can stay in lane and potentially out last your opponent. With a limited territory you actually increase your opportunity to claim more ground when necessary, in order to deal more damage. Let me put it this way, if you wind up claiming most of your lane as worked ground you will limit your available positions from which you can actually utilize your ability in order to deal damage when you need to. As well as limiting the mana needed to do so.

The Tear > Archangl's + RoA build is mostly an interesting, new mechanic from the updated items that I feel works particularly well with her and this concept.

MrBuffington1 votes

I think the tear build is situational. If you're in a farm lane or some lane where you have to play passive and just wave clear with EW, then sure it might be useful. RoA is still overkill. Not to mention it actually doesn't give that much mana. Morello would be the superior option.

The thing is her Q actually discourages spam, and because you get the refund, you don't need to worry about mana if you're spamming it on worked ground. Your innate regen and Dorans still makes up a ton, not to mention blue buff and water dragon. The only reason you need a ton of mana is if you're spamming your EW.

If you want to try and stay in lane forever, you can go for mana stacking builds, but it's really not the point of her kit. Her passive, used correctly, let's you back and return to lane much faster than a lot of mages. Her roams are too strong to just sit in lane and afk farm. Like you can play TF and just sit in lane and blue card everything, but then you're not using the rest of his kit to its potential.

Duke Anax1 votes

No mater if intended or not it certainly is feasible enough.

I jusdt did a RoAmumu and i was litterally crying for some health.

Quepha1 votes

The full cast is just better, regardless of the partial mana refund. Whether you have 500 mana or 4000, it is more efficient to cast on un-worked ground. If you have a small mana pool you absolutely do not want to be wasting mana on only one bolt, even if it's half the mana cost of a full 5 bolts.

A much more interesting mana refund interaction is Cassiopeia with a Catalyst. Catalyst restores health when mana is spent, and Cass spends mana every time she casts Twin Fang. When Twin Fang kills a target she gets a refund of the mana spent. Because she spends the mana and then gets a refund, she gets healed despite not really spending any mana at all. Taliyah has a similar interaction with Catalyst on worked ground in that she gets healed based on a 60-80 mana spell despite only spending 30-40 mana, but a 50% refund is much less interesting than 100%.

Elite4Runner1 votes

{quoted}

The full cast is just better, regardless of the partial mana refund. Whether you have 500 mana or 4000, it is more efficient to cast on un-worked ground. If you have a small mana pool you absolutely do not want to be wasting mana on only one bolt, even if it's half the mana cost of a full 5 bolts.

A much more interesting mana refund interaction is Cassiopeia with a Catalyst. Catalyst restores health when mana is spent, and Cass spends mana every time she casts Twin Fang. When Twin Fang kills a target she gets a refund of the mana spent. Because she spends the mana and then gets a refund, she gets healed despite not really spending any mana at all. Taliyah has a similar interaction with Catalyst on worked ground in that she gets healed based on a 60-80 mana spell despite only spending 30-40 mana, but a 50% refund is much less interesting than 100%.

Hence the item 3070 > item 3003. It ends up only being 12 mana spent. You're right, it isn't 100% but it is 85%, which is still impressive.

And honestly the fact that you are spending less mana and dealing less damage isn't the real focus for this concept. When people expand her worked ground they are actually decreasing her threat. When people start to figure this out they will learn how to play against her. If your lane is filled with worked ground you are significantly less threatening than if you only have a few patches. If your enemy knows that they can approach you or force you from an angle that requires you to move to or remain on worked ground, they will know you can't retaliate. You must keep in mind that threat is just as much of a utility as mana.

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